Frankie, 44, was widely criticised for certain jokes he made on Harvey Price, as well as Olympic swimmer Rebecca Adlington, the royals, race, Maddie McCann, the Israel-Palestine conflict, Down’s Syndrome and many other subjects.

After quitting Mock The Week, Frankie described the BBC Trust — who’d investigated his jokes on several occasions — as “cravenly afraid of giving offence” and “frightening the horses”.

His new show has been described as “challenging viewing”, and while no details are out about it yet, it’s thought to be about the general election.

The programme was not included on the BBC’s official spring-summer season announcement, but the man who commissioned it says Frankie can make the channel feel “contemporary” and “relevant”.

BBC Two controller Patrick Holland said: “If we’re going to be making the channel feel more contemporary and more relevant, we want to be looking at the issues of the day and Frankie is one of those voices that does that.

During one of his stand-up shows, Frankie made two separate jokes about Harvey, the first being: “Jordan and Peter Andre are still fighting each other over custody of Harvey – eventually one of them will lose and have to keep him.”

He went on add: “I have a theory about the reason Jordan married a cage fighter – she needed a man strong enough to stop Harvey from f****** her…”

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